Wharnecliffe Walk and House Martins

We set out to start on our House Martin Survey on behalf of the British Trust for Ornithology but when we got to the few houses within our allocated kilometre square there were swifts and swallows but no sign of House Martins.  (Actually I'd stopped on the roadside in May to check out the birds that were flying and didn't see any then either).  I had three lovely chats with people who live in the farms and houses in our square who promised to get in touch if they saw any of the birds.  We did spot them on the North York Moors when we were on holiday but they were in places that were not part of the survey - though I think there is a way of feeding back this information.  We had a lovely, but very, very windy walk among the trees along the Wharnecliffe edge and came across this Trig Point now well ensconced among the trees - it made us reflect upon the way technology has moved on now that map making is done via satellite technology and not with theodolites.  They'd have to do quite a bit of tree clearance to use this site today.

p.s. I was awake very early and managed to catch the early morning sun as it briefly streamed through the ginnel onto the everlasting wall-flowers (extra photos).